Heirs
by Thewomenalwaysknow
Summary: Short stories featuring our beloved characters from the show but mainly YOUNG DO/EUN SANG and TAN
1. These Violent Delights have Violent Ends

Eun Sang thinks he's lying when he says that he won't see her again. He's Cha Young Do, he's never told the truth a day in his life, so she smirks at that and waits for him to invade her personal space in that way she's accustomed to. He doesn't show.

It's the first week after his grand declaration, and she's still skeptical at his determination, it's a game she's sure, it's always a game with him. He doesn't come to school either.

She wants to ask Tan about him; where is he, what is he doing, what's he been up to? But she holds her tongue when she sees him watching her watching the entrance door, gum popping in her mouth, eyes darting to and fro and she's sure he's starting to put two and two together.

It's ridiculous, she shouldn't care. She should be happy. Young Do had done nothing but make her feel like a slave trying to sit at the masters' table. Always reminded her that she was lost; this was not her place to be. His hands had always been rough on her, she still had bruises from the last time he had dug his nails into her wrists. He's hurt her more times than she can count. She shouldn't care.

She really shouldn't.

Three weeks in and she makes a resolve to visit him at his hotel. It's a stupid plan, she knows. She'll offer herself like the sacrificial lamb that they all seem to think she is and he'll devour her whole, and Eun Sang isn't sure she'll hate it.

She lies to Tan, Tells him that she's going to study with Bo Na all night for the test tomorrow. He knows she's lying like he always does but he takes it like a good boy and tells her to call him when she gets home. She should feel guilty, but she doesn't.

She takes the Elevator, thinks about what she'll say _; I came because I was worried because you didn't come to school we have a test tomorrow half the marks count for the semesters end exam, I need you here with me, I need you…I need you._

He opens the door after five knocks, she counted, with a solemn expression on his face and she's sure she's made a mistake. She should turn around and leave, go back to Tan who's safe and nice and doesn't leave bruises when he touches her.

"Well, isn't this surprising?" He asks, a smile playing on his lips and Eun Sang knows she's lost whatever game he's playing.

"We have a test tomorrow, you haven't studied." She pushes her way into the luxurious hotel, with its big ceiling and all white décor and his smell everywhere.

"You came here to tell me to study? I don't know if you've noticed, but I haven't been to school for three weeks."

Eun Sang watches him for missing signals, signs telling her what to do or says that will make whatever is going on better. But his face is closed, no emotions sneak her way unwarranted. He'll always be the one in charge.

"I'm dropping out. I figure it's about time I put everyone out of their misery and leave gracefully, you know, put my talent to torment others to good use somewhere where they'll be fully appreciated."

Eun-sang puts her bag on the white leather couch, she doesn't know why she's doing it, she saw him, and he's living and breathing. She can go home now. She shouldn't be making herself comfortable.

"Not everyone hates you."

"Yes, I'm sure I'll be terribly missed."

"You will be."

"By who"

"Me."

He puts his glass down on the table, walks over to her at a leisure pace and she knows how this will end. She should leave, Tan was waiting for her to call him and assure him that she was fine. She should go.

"We are hardly friends Eun Sang, not even acquaintances and you hate me. Why would you miss me?"

He sits on the table, close to her, so close she can feel his breath on her ear.

"I don't hate you." He chuckles at that.

"I don't believe you."

She almost cries out in frustration. "I'm telling the truth."

"Does Tan even know you're here or did you also say one of your little facts?" Eun Sang suddenly remembers why she hates him so much. He had the uncanny ability to frustrate everyone to self-distraction, with his smell and his touch…those fingers that were lightly caressing her hair.

"This isn't about Tan, it's about you leaving and me wanting you to stay." She slaps his hand away.

"Well, I'm all ears-convince me."

He cocks his head to her, his ear to her mouth and she does what she knows he wants, what he's always wanted and presses her lips to his cheeks. He moves his head closer, and her heart is hammering in her chest, leave, Tan; think of Tan- pleasant, safe Tan.

Her mouth finds him, and he's still sitting on the table, and she's still standing awkwardly to his side, so she closes that distant too, and it feels like she just signed her papers and handed it to the devil; _you may do what you please with me._ His mouth is warm and soft against hers, and she can taste the liquor on his tongue, he doesn't try to deepen the kiss, his hands are safely tucked on each side of him.

"Do you want me to stop?" Eun Sang asks, her voice foreign to her. _What are you doing? Leave, now._

"I…if you continue I might not let you leave." His breath tickles her face when he speaks and all the warmth she feels pools between her thighs.

"I don't want to stop."

The words don't entirely leave her mouth when his lips find her. They're rough like she expects them to be, teeth clashing, tongues dancing, his hands kneading her arse but she still wants more.

"Stay, Please." She says it over and over again until she sounds like a broken record. But she feels like he'll never believe her like she'll wake up and he'll be gone. She needs him to stay.

His mouth lingers on her throat, hands working their way underneath her blouse, pinching her nipples. Her shirt finds itself on the white carpet, her skirt, her bra and her underwear.

She expects him to be quiet in bed, to master that broody intensity of his to a tee but he is surprisingly talkative. He asks her how she feels, where she wants it and how she likes it. She would hate it if his voice didn't make her womanhood quiver, clench, and tingle in pleasure. Was it even possible to be sexually attracted to a voice?

He has her sitting at the edge of the bed her feet on the ground and her legs separated by his knees. He's looming over her while she's completely naked and he's wearing too many clothes for the occasion. He kisses her until her head meets the soft bed and his kissing her lower, her throat, her breast, her stomach until his mouth reaches her center. It's warm and wet and frankly speaking she's been waiting for him to find his way there since she opened the door.

But she won't admit that. She wills herself not to moan too loudly when Young Do's lips suck her clit, and his teeth graze her pussy, but that plan gets repeatedly foiled when he looks at her while his tongue is thrusting into her, hitting all her right spots. She feels it coming, but she's still surprised when she comes. She's twitching and thrusting and- "Fuck-Yes."

She lies there still feeling the tingling sensation in her hair, in her veins, and in her toes and it feels damn good. Young Do lies down beside her and cuddles her naked body with his heat, stroking her back gently, kissing her shoulders and until she drifts off to sleep.

Eun Sang mentally kicks herself when she wakes up to an empty bed, and her uniform dry cleaned and waiting for her at the foot of the bed. She should've known he would be gone in the morning hell, she should've left right after.

She takes her shower, tries not to cry or feel any emotion other than indifference, but the surge of disappointment hits her when she notices that everything that should show a small indication that he was ever there or that anything happened has been cleaned and tucked neatly away. She dresses quietly, looking around if she's left anything then leaves for school.

She turns her phone on to be met by thirty missed calls from Tan wondering where she is and why Bo Na doesn't know where she is either. Bo Na too has left messages, and she can't bring herself to hear her judgmental prissy voice, so she opts for a text message. "Will explain when I get to school." Bo Na sends one right after telling her "Okay."

She won't call Tan, she can't, she hopes not to see him at school, but those plans are throated when she spots him waiting for her at the school entrance.

"You didn't call me back." He starts. Neither his voice nor his face gives anything away, he says it matter of factly like he's explaining why the sun still shines when it's cloudy.

"I know, I was busy."

"I called Bo Na, she said you guys never had a study date." He searches Eun Sang's face as they walk in, his eyes drinking in the panic in hers. "And your mom hadn't seen you all day."

"I was busy." Eun Sang won't say more than that. The answers are all at the tip of her tongue lined up like soldiers preparing for war, but she won't budge.

He lets it go even though he knows there's more to it than she wants him to know. Tan is nice and safe but still very temperamental and irrational… and childish when he wants to so he doesn't take her bag from her like he always does, nor does he take her hand in his displaying that she was his, he looks at her one last time and stalks off to class without her.

"Trouble in paradise?" Young Do's leaning on her locker when she gets there like he has every right to be. She wants to slap the smugness right off his face, but she stays her hand. No need to create any more scenes.

"Leave me alone." She shoves her school jacket in her locker along with her bag and slams it shut.

"I remember you saying or rather moaning that you wanted me to stay." His face is too close for comfort, his breath is tickling her, and the warmth of it sends shivers to all in the wrong places.

"You heard wrong." She starts walking towards her English class when he catches her by the elbow and shoves her in an empty broom closet.

She tries to fight him off, but his grip on her elbow tightens and she exhausts herself trying to get out of it. He lets her go, and she slaps him, hard on his cheek leaving a red scorching mark. He doesn't react to that, so she hits him on his hard chest until he has her prisoner in his arms.

She cries until both bells ring for them to go to class. None of them move.

His stroking her hair and kissing her head and muttering things in her ear that makes her go all gooey and soft on the inside- she can almost feel her sanity leaving her.

"I know you love him or whatever you want to call what you feel for him, but he's going to leave you. He'll hold your hand and make you feel safe with his grand gestures, but it will only be a matter of time before he leaves you high and dry."

His voice has taken an almost violent calmness that unnerves her and makes her weak in the knees.

"The difference between him and me is that I know how it feels like to be abandoned by someone you love" he pauses. "I will never do that to you."

Young Do lift her chin with his fingers to look in her eyes, she had been avoiding that, and tells her that he won't make her do anything anymore. It sounds exactly like the time he said he won't see her anymore.

"I want you, all or you- trust me- but not while Tan is in the picture."

She intends to snort at that, how mature of him, she'd thought the mere thought of having his dirty ways with her while Tan was at home waiting for her to call would excite him immensely but the seriousness of his voice tells her she's wrong.

She shakes her head. They'll be no choosing, it was a one-time thing, there's no need for choosing.

He lets her go, and she wonders listlessly until half her classes are over. She can't go in there because Tan will be there and Young Do will be there and… she can't deal with any of them.

By lunch, Tan somehow manages to find her. She's on the rooftop where he first kissed her, her back to the entrance looking over the city. She should choose, it's the mature thing to do. She loved Tan, it shouldn't be that hard a desition to make but, she had this growing need for Young Do that she was sure it would do her in sooner rather than later.

She turns around when she feels someone watching her, she finds Tan in his plain white shirt and Khaki pants, one hand in his pocket and his hair disheveled looking at her with an askew expression.

"You didn't have to skip class because of me." He doesn't make a move to get closer, and neither does she.

"It wasn't-I just needed to clear my head." Eun Sang feels wrong being on this side of the tracks. He was always the one screwing up, always the one always needing to validate that yes; he loved her, yes; he will not leave her, and she always forgave him. Now he looked like he knew exactly what had been keeping her busy.

"I'm sorry, I really am." She says it like she means it, a part of her does, the part that wants to choose him and ride this storm out with him, and the part that wants them to work out.

"For what? Not calling me or spending the night with Young Do?"

She stutters and takes a step back. She should start with begging then move on to groveling if that didn't work, throw in the tear works; he hated it when she cried. He'd forgive her, he loved her enough to do that- but she doesn't make a sound.

"You thought I didn't know? You and Bo Na hate each other. If it weren't for the mutual interest in Min Hyuk's wellbeing, you'd have already torn each other's throats to pieces." He smiles a genuine smile and then breaks out into hysterical laughter. "That was such a stupid excuse, I mean really."

"I'm sorry." It's the only thing she can say. Eun Sang wants to cross the distance and hug him and tell him that she's sorry over and over again, but her brain can't send the signal to her feet. She can't move.

"Did you sleep with him?"

She doesn't know how to answer that.

"Yes."

"Did you like it? Because I feel like if he forced himself on you, I could deal with that. I can have him killed, and they'd be nothing to forgive. Don't tell me-"

"Nothing happened that I didn't want to happen."

His hands are in his hair, and he's pacing and smiling and pacing. He keeps getting closer but not enough for her to touch. She knows this is how he deals with being hurt, he won't let her touch him again.

"You won't even let me touch anything under your shirt, and you sleep with him? He hates you, the only reason he's with you is to get to me." He's pacing, and it's starting to make her feel dizzy and sick. His smile is slowly fading, he's getting angry, she can see it, it's barely on the surface, but she can spot it.

"Do you love him? Is this what's it about?" He's stammering like he can't get everything he wants to say fast enough out of his mouth. Like he wants to read himself over every word that's clogging his windpipes, he looks at her like he looks at his brother, someone he wants to love him so much it's violent.

"I'm sorry." She utters when he falls silent waiting for the last thing to come out of her mouth that will do him in. "I really am."

"That's not an answer." He growls.

"We'll never work. My mother is a deaf maid at your family's beck and call, who doesn't even know who the father of her children is. Your father hates me, he can't even stand the sight of me, so I have to hide and live in a room that would rival any of your smallest cupboards." Eun sang's mouth feels dry, too dry that she can barely say the next words. "I'm a Fantasy Tan. You don't love me, you don't even know the first thing about me."

He's shaking his head. "No."

"I'm everything that your whole being goes against. I'm poor and-I'm not beautiful. I'll never be what you need." He wants to interrupt her, but she holds her hand for him to wait for her to finish.

"But you're what I want." He tells her, the tears are freely running from his face.

"I'm sorry." Because she is.

She doesn't hang around school longer than necessary. She leaves at the first sound of the bell and breaks into a run towards Young Do's hotel. By the time she gets there her hair is clinging to her face and her neck, her heart hammering in her chest she's sure she'll pass out any moment now.

She bangs his door, his answers after the third time this time.

His eyes take her in.

"I chose." She pushes her way into the luxurious hotel suite, dumping her bag on the floor and removing her coat. "I feel like I'm always going to hate you for making me do it. But I chose, and it's you." She pauses turning around to see his eyes dancing in amusement. "So you can't leave. Ever."

He doesn't say anything. He closes the distance between them in one stride and kisses her. His lips feel tender and soft on hers. She didn't cry when she broke up with Tan, but this makes her want to cry. The way he's looking at her like she hung the moon and his hands worshiping her body-

She shouldn't cry. But the more his lips find places to worry and fret over on her body the more she wants to cry.

She sobs quietly into her hands because she won't let him see her face. Young Do takes her hands and tries to look at her, she turns her head in the opposite direction. This goes on for a while before he sighs heavily and lets her cry into his chest all the while muttering that he knows and that he's sorry.


	2. Children of the damned

"You spent a whole year pinning and making moon eyes at her- you were obsessed with her!"

YoungDo could explain the mess, tell them why and how- or all the repressed feelings that threaten to surface whenever her name is mentioned but he won't. What's the point?

"I was not obsessed with her. I was merely infatuated." He answers somberly. His sitting on the only bar stool still standing in the kitchen, it's the only one that's still whole. Myung Soo having run out of luck was sitting on the kitchen island trying to avoid asking why his house looked like he had just been robbed.

"You used to follow her home. You were so creepy."

"I was. Why didn't you stop me?" That could go for everything. Why didn't anyone stop him? They could've all saved him the heartache, the trouble of having to avoid every single class she was in which were most. He barely set foot in school unless his often absent father would force him to go and that wasn't often.

"You know Tan has been hanging around her a lot lately. Trying to rekindle their past flame or whatever." They've moved from the kitchen to the living room or whatever is left of it. Myung Soo's trying to ease his way into asking the question he's been dying to know. Hoping Young Do will tell him on his own accord.

Young Do somehow doesn't find that surprising. Eun- She had insisted on maintaining a friendship or a cordial relationship between them, they lived in the same house; it would be silly to avoid each other just because things between them didn't work out and she decided to jump into bed with his enemy. She felt sorry for Tan, he had no friends, and if she was, to be honest, he was a bit socially awkward. He agrees to it as long as he's not being forced to be friends with Tan.

"You should come back you know?" Myung Soo's picking up the discarded pillows on the floor, lifting the couch back up and moving it back to where it's supposed to be. Young Do watch him for a good twenty minutes, letting the silence send him into a false sense of tranquility until Myung Soo gets curious again.

The living room looks half decent when an idea strikes him. He should just leave, go back look for his mother, finish high school somewhere else, try his hand at being normal- or as normal as he can be.

More than being angry, he is tired. Tired of his father, tired of himself and the fact that he is turning exactly like the person he hates the most. Of his life and the things that are expected of him. He bets if he had a mother things would be different.

The idea of his mother in his life sends a cold shiver down his spine and his on the floor before he knows it. Myung Soo's gone by then, he'll be back tomorrow to see how he's holding up and it's weird that he's the only constant thing in his life right now. He can't feel sad about it, his almost nineteen his father will have his manhood stripped from him before he lets him cry over his mother.

He wants to, just like he wants to cry over the fact that he has ruined the only good thing in his life. How he can't say her name out loud, how the fact that Tan is lingering around her, the reason that she laughs, the person that she leans on instead of him. He can't even hate Tan for that because he's the reason that she's with him in the first place.

Young Do thinks of the similarities between his mother and Eun-S- her. How it was the reason, he hated her on sight. It's not much really, they both have dark brown hair, brown eyes but that could be said about a number of women he knows. It wasn't really much he knows, but she had a strange calmness to her when she wasn't trying to hand his ass to him that invited him in, it was probably the only reason he enjoyed ruffling her feathers so much.

Rachel is at his front door boring his eyes his as he watches from the monitor in his living room. He thinks of pretending he's not home but the lights are on everywhere, and his motorcycle is parked on the lawn- that we'll give his father a field day- He should just let her in.

"What do you want?" He asks from the intercom.

"Let me in, asshole."

"No."

"Have it your way then." He sees her throw her back over the gate which isn't all that tall but it's tall for her. She removes her high heels and climbs the iron gate, she jumps when she feels she's close enough to the ground with a low thud and then proceeds to slip her way barefoot to his house;

Young Do sighs and meets her at the door.

"You know you could have spared yourself all of this and come on another day."

"You wouldn't have let me in." She says ducking his arms and getting into the house uninvited. If he was going, to be honest with himself, Rachel was never willingly invited anywhere. That's why she was probably so good at jumping over gates.

She stands there dripping superiority and arrogance with her long nose scrunched up.

"Your father is going to kill you." She says it flatly like she says everything like emotions are a thing she can't be bothered to insert into her vocabulary.

"Have you come to state the obvious or is there an actual purpose to this unwanted visit?"

"Myung Soo asked me to come."

"Liar."

"Whatever- I came because your little girlfriend has been spending too much time with my fiancé and I'd really like it to stop. Aren't you guys like this?" She crosses her fingers.

"I- she's not my girlfriend anymore just like Tan hasn't been your fiancé in a long time."

"That's a small technicality that will be smoothed over in due time. Don't fret your little head step-brother." She puts her handbag on the floor and sits on the black leather couch. Crosses then uncrossed her legs "so, details I'd like to know what I'm dealing with before I sentence her to death without good reason. Not that I need a good reason, her insufferable good girl act is reason enough."

Young Do rolls his eyes.

"Aren't you tired? Tan doesn't want you, he makes this clear every chance he gets. I'd think with all that pride of yours, you'd have come to that conclusion sooner rather than later."

Rachel shoots him her death glare, and he stops talking. "He just needs a little time to adjust. He was away for three years- he'll come around soon enough."

"If you say so."

"What happened with you and miss goody two shoes? You ruffle her feathers a bit too hard? You showed her just how fucked up this family is? Or did she finally realize that apart from your tall, dark and brooding looks you really have nothing going on for you?" She smirks as she says that and it takes Young Do all his strength not to throw something at her. She smirks harder when silence is followed by her question.

The truth is he doesn't know why he broke up with her. There are a bunch of reasons that are floating in his mind, but he can't pick any of them because he knows he'll sound silly saying it out loud.

"We just weren't compatible."

"Who says things like compatible? You sound like an old lady."

"I feel like an old lady."

They look at each other and burst out laughing until Rachel starts shaking uncontrollably and tears are falling from her eyes. She's motioning that she can't breathe and Young Do is still standing at the door, it's still open because he wasn't planning on entertaining her bitchiness longer than necessary, he doesn't know what to do.

He runs to the kitchen and grabs paperback and shoves it in front of her mouth.

"Breathe."

She does just that. Her face looks calmer, her movements less frantic but her eyes are still wet and his thinking how he can't deal with her shit too. Hell, he can't even deal with his own.

"God, we're such losers." She finally says. He accepts that that's probably the most honest and truthful thing she'll ever tell him about herself.

"That we are."

He lets her stay a while. She still won't let the issue go. She follows him around the house like the annoying little sister he didn't want or ask for.

"Honestly, if you don't tell me who are you going to tell? Your father? You tell him a girl broke your heart and it makes you feel all wrong and painful inside he will rip that hurt out himself to put himself out of the misery of having to listen to you. That's if he actually you know, cares enough to come home to his only child. But what do I know?"

" _Rachel_." He says her name warningly. She trading thin ice and she better watch out.

" _Young Do_." She draws his name out with the same annoyance. His honestly never meant anyone more reckless than her.

Young Do thinks about starting at the beginning, but there's that whole issue of having to relive those few moments when he was happy with Eun-her and he can't. He tries to narrow down the feelings surging inside of him to one, so he can tell it like it is. He was never one to sugarcoat anything, and he wasn't about to start.

It begins when his father's company gets raided by the prosecutor's office. Their name is in the paper, and his father is drinking more than usual, and drinking always means women but when the women leave he gets violent. He thinks he should be happy, Karma or whatever is serving him a hot plate for being the shitty father he's always been but he can't. His father's money meant his protection from being target no. 1 in school. His terrorized enough people to know there are a few with enough means to entertain the idea of revenge, and he'll be damned if he ends on that end of the spectrum.

In the day he avoids school and Eun S- her, she notices how on edge he is and angry. Very upset and it's directed to a lot of people but mostly her. His mostly trying to push her away, so he won't hurt her physically or emotionally, he also doesn't want to have to explain why he has been spotting a black eye for the past two weeks. He doesn't want to explain anything at all.

They're sitting at their usual spot at lunch, she's holding his hand kinda doing that thing that calms and arouses him all at the same time. Her fingers are caressing his bruising hands, talking about her plans for college and how she and Tan were talking about attending the same college since his father is paying her tuition.

He jacks his hand away from her. He isn't exactly angry at that, her relationship with Tan is over, and he's had her in more ways than Tan will ever imagine but that ticks him off. He's glaring at her, his jaw set, and he just wants to punch a hole in the wall until his fist is raw with pain.

She ignores the change in his body language, she continues talking, her hands are back on his soothing, pleading with him.

"You know his dad still thinks that Tan has a shot or whatever, I told him explicitly that I had no desire to start anything other than friendship with Tan and that I had someone in my life. He didn't believe me of course because Tan has been pushing this whole going to the same college idea for a while now."

"You told him about us?"

"I thought about it. But I don't want him dragging your father into this- I haven't even met him."

"So what did you say?"

"Since it's his money he should send me wherever he sees fit."

There's silence. Her hands are doing a good job at calming Young Do down. He's as calm as he can be.

"Anyway I was thinking after school, I could come over you know, to meet your dad. You've already met my mom-"

"No" He yanks his hands away from her. Moves his chair a bit further and puts some distance between them.

"It will be okay. I'll just-"

"I said no."

She's starting to get upset, and Young Do can't deal with her right now. He'd rather be anywhere but here.

"What is your problem?"

"I have no problem."

She scoffs at that and pulls her chair closer, so close she's basically leaning onto him, he can smell her floral perfume, and he can't remember the last time they had sex.

"You keep shutting me out. What's going on?" She's whispering so no one could hear them arguing, and they've been arguing a lot lately.

"I'm not-"

"Don't lie to me. You have. You keep showing up at night looking like someone has done a number on you and you don't tell me anything. You won't even look at me." She holds his chin between her fingers and forces his head down until he's looking at her.

"Look at me Young Do. I'm going to ask one last time, what is going on with you?"

His hands are shaking while she pries his face open with her questions. He can't do this, he won't even talk to himself about his father how is he supposed to talk to her about it?

"Eun Sang, I want to tell you I really do but it will change everything I'd rather just be us."

"Things are already changing. You don't trust me with yourself, and I don't know if I can trust me with you either."

He chews the insides of his cheeks until he tastes blood. He knows what she's going to say, he's been waiting for a month now.

"I just can't." He makes a move to stand up, but she yanks him back down.

"You leave now, here, we are done. No, take backs. I am seriously tired of your shit."

He straightens his jackets. He should probably say goodbye, but part of him knows they'll saunter their way back to each other like they always do.

"Then I guess this is it. Have a good life."

"Have a good life?" Rachel is cackling on the couch. "You are an idiot."

"What was I supposed to say? Oh! Eun Sang, I love you, but my father has been abusive since I can remember and I'm scared I'll turn out like him."

They stop because they both realize what he's just said. Her name and the problem in the same sentence.

"I'm not her biggest fan, but I actually think that she cares about you. Just tell her the truth."

"I knew you wouldn't understand."

"I understand that you're a coward."

He still thinks about leaving. It's been a while but things with Eun Sang aren't far beyond fixing, he just doesn't know if he wants to fix anything. Yet.

He's flipping his phone between his fingers contemplating calling her when his father turns the keys in the door. Rachel is long gone by then and he's thankful for that.

His father looks at the mess, it's the first time he's set foot at home in two months, and somehow he looks shorter and older than Young Do remembers him. He doesn't comment on the mess or acknowledges his presence in the room. He walks straight to his office and locks himself up for two hours before Young Do makes the decision to go and find Eun Sang.

He won't tell her everything just enough for her to forgive him


	3. Strife

The disappointment shouldn't feel half as painful as it does, you know? She should be used to being the one left behind, I mean it's happened so many times she doesn't understand why her whole face is bloated from crying and how she can barely stop her nose from running but here she is. In his house, very much whole, very much aware of what she is supposed to do next because this is a script that Young Do never gets too tired to reenact.

She packs her little leather duffle bag with everything that doesn't belong to her, his shirt, his t-shirt, his sweater and she stands in the bathroom long enough to decide why not take his cologne while she's at it.

He's taken so much from her, the least she can do is take a few souvenirs, something to show for all the time and energy she spent loving a man who didn't know how to be loved.

 _"_ _Trust me, if I want to kiss you, you'll know."_

 _"_ _Ki-kiss? I don't even like you-."_

 _"_ _You keep telling yourself that."_

Eun Sang is twenty-three when they break up for the seventh time. Her long black hair travels down her back like a dark waterfall, and all she can think about is how much he liked that she had long hair. How it felt to have his big hands in it and how he'd attempt to braid it on days that she was too lazy to do anything to it.

She wants to cut it. She should.

"You know what's the worst thing is?"

Bo Na has heard so many versions of this story she's surprised when she doesn't start guessing where the story will end- because Bo Na is brutally honest if she's anything at all but she doesn't say anything.

"I failed the whole semester because I was helping him work on his thesis! I basically threw my future and scholarship away for some guy who can pay to get a reincarnation of Einstein as his tutor!"

She's on her second bottle, and she's never really been good at holding her liquor, but since the meeting, Young Do she has learned a thing or two about anger and alcohol.

"Like, my whole future! My mom is going to kill me." She says that with the most desperation she can master, but she knows no one will be more disappointed in her than herself.

She doesn't cry with Bo Na there. She's hard steel and dirty mouthed and harsh-tongued and none of the mess that she was before going back to her roommate.

 _"_ _I loved him."_

 _"_ _You'll love others."_

 _"_ _No, it's him or no one."_

 _"_ _They'll be others."_

"Eun Sang!" Her head feels like it's going to burst into two when she hears Bo Na call her name. The room is too dark for it to be anywhere near morning.

"What? What?!" Eun Sang slurs because she's still very much drunk and very much aware that this was not the time to be waking her up.

"He's here."

"Who?"

"Young Do."

"What does he want?"

"To take you home."

Her head is protesting all the way she's in the car his hand on hers like it belongs there like he hasn't just let her seen all seven hells repeatedly like there was nothing to talk about but her head is protesting, and she can't muster the energy to tell him to fuck off.

That would require dignity, and everyone knew that she had none.

 _"_ _You're a tough cookie, I like that."_

 _She scoffed because he was an idiot who refused to leave her alone._

 _"_ _You'll soften up, and before you know it, you'll be falling apart in my arms."_

The house is still some variations of warm like they just popped out for some quick grocery shopping, it still smells like her tears, and his words still echo on the walls, and all she wants to do is sleep.

"I'm sorry." He says it like he says everything, empty with none of the sincerity of someone who had drilled a hole over and over into her.

But he wasn't fully to blame, she always let him.

She finds out at age twenty-three, seven hard years of loving him that his love wasn't even a quarter of her half.

But he liked her hair long and dark, and his hands in them were one of the best feelings she could think of.

But he was sorry each time, and that had to count for something.

But he loved her once with all the intensity of the sun, and that had to mean something.

It had to.


End file.
